>> from new york city, this is democracy now! >> there are people in areas without power. what about generators for them? you are making billionaires'. donate. >> as new york mayor michael bloomberg cancels the new york marathon under enormous city, we report on three of the hardest hit areas of new york and patent by superstorm sandy. statins island, the rockaway, and red hook. power returns to most of manhattan, but for most in the outer residents, many are still in the dark. >> it has been very hectic, especially for the little ones.

it is kind of crazy. we need help. >> as the temperature at night drops near freezing, frustration is growing as residents complain about lack of food, power, and warm clothes. and we will look at how occupy wall street has transformed into occupied sandy relief. and could republican voter suppression swing the state of ohio for mitt romney? we will speak to our lieberman. >> it is not about stopping voter fraud but about republicans try to shape an electorate in their own favor, to make it harder for minority and low-income voters to vote in the next election. >> this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. haiti is grappling with yet another crisis one week after

hurricane sandy hit. the united nations is warning that sandy destroyed 74% of their crops and left 1.5 million people in serious risk of wonder. the death toll stands at 54. the storm destroyed 21,000 homes and caused $104 million in damage. large parts of the south are still unreachable by land due to massive flooding, sparking fears of a new outbreak of cholera. the devastation comes as haiti is still trying to rebuild from the massive 2010 earthquake that killed 300,000 people. power has been restored to close to 80% of the 8.5 million households across 16 states left in the dark after last week's storm. that leaves 1.85 million still without power, including 1 million in new jersey, the state

hardest hit. in new york city, subway service has most the been restored as the slowly begins its recovery, but with the blood in damaging thousands of homes, mayor michael bloomberg warned of a new housing crisis for up to 45,000 displaced residents in need of shelter. >> we do not have a lot of empty housing in this city. so it is really a problem to find housing. we are not going to let anybody go sleeping in the streets. we are not going to let anyone go without blankets, food, and water, but it is a challenge that we are working on. >> the 2012 presidential race is in its final day of campaigning before voters head to the polls tuesday to make their choice. on sunday, president obama and mitt romney each crisscrossed four battleground states in a frenzied effort to get out the

vote. speaking in florida, obama said romney would revive the harshest policies of previous republican administrations. >> this is not just a choice between two parties and candidates, it is a choice between keaton evoke different visions of america. on the one hand, you can choose to return to the top down policies that crashed our economy. or you can join me and build a future that focuses on a strong and growing middle class. [applause] >> after a tightened race over the past month, president obama appears to have regained the momentum. speaking in ohio, mitt romney called president obama a failed president. >> i would ask them to put aside all the speeches and ads and all the attacks, and look at the records. you see, talk is cheap.

but a record is a real and is a turn with a real effort. change is not measured in words and speeches. change is measured in achievements. >> as mitt romney and president obama push for a strong turnout, the election will likely end up setting a record for early voting. 1.6 million people have already voted in the ohio at the polls or with absentee ballots. long lines were reported across the state over the weekend as lined up for hours at the polls. ohio republican secretary john huston has issued a new last- minute directive that would disqualify ballots not accompanied by a form accurately documenting the type of identification used. attorneys for the northeast ohio coalition for the homeless and service employees international

union have filed a challenge in court. in florida, democrats filed a lawsuit seeking to force republican governor rick scott to extend early voting. he and the republican state legislature reduced early voting last year, and now voters are seeing waits of more than six hours at the polls. on sunday, a judge ordered hours to be extended after a bomb threat closed one location for several hours. we will have more on this later in the broadcast. new figures show outside groups such as super pacs have spent $1.1 billion on the 2012 elections. the figure marks a 400% increase over outside spending in 2008 to more than 60% of the nearly $441 million raised by super pacs came from a group of just 91 people. a separate report has them dark

money groups which are able to donate anonymously and have spent $213 million through november 1, with 81% of the money colon to republican candidates. syria's main opposition groups have opened up unity talks in qatar. the meeting comes days after the obama administration withdrew its support for that syrian national council and said syria's opposition to be more representative. on sunday, syrian forces shelled a palestinian camp near damascus. more than 11 people were wounded in the capital when a bomb struck a government building. in kuwait, state forces have again attacked a protest of thousands of people challenging the ruling monarchy's's effort to change electoral laws. the regime has stoked anger after but dissolving parliament

and opposing voting laws on sunday, the kuwaiti police fired stun grenades, tear gas, and smoke bombs at protesters blocking a major road south of the capital of kuwait city. it was the second crackdown inside kuwait in two weeks. an israeli television network is reporting israel's military leaders rebuffed orders from prime minister netanyahu and defence minister a who brock -- ehud barak during an order to strike. the order was rejected after top officials concluded that doing so would be illegal and would set up a dangerous chain of events that could lead to global conflicts. video has emerged from colorado of a heavily-armed police

contingent carrying out an eviction order at the home of a woman in colorado springs. 63-year old sahara donahue had enlisted the help local occupy activists after u.s. bank ordered her to vacate her home. when activists set up a barricade to delay the eviction last week, at least 10 truckloads of police reportedly arrived at the scene carrying heavy weaponry. the police forced the activists onto the ground at gunpoint before barging into the home and carrying out the eviction. those are some of the headlines. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. i am glad to be home. with temperatures dropping into the 30's at night, concern is growing for the nearly 2 million people still without power after superstorm sandy.

while power had been restored to most of manhattan, many of the hardest-hit areas of the city@ remain in the dark, including s.i., rockaways, and red hook. in new jersey, more than a million people without power. new york mayor michael bloomberg said 40,000 displaced residents are now in need of shelter. we begin today in the rockaways, a peninsula located in the southeast section of the city. our producer mike burke travel there on friday. >> if he did not see the people sitting outside, it looks like a war zone. it is eerie. >> we are here at 91st street in the pharma section of queens, new york. four days after hurricane sandy devastated this community. we are standing next to what was

the boardwalk that used to stretch along the beach. the boardwalk now takes up much of the street. you can see it on top of cars that were part here. residents tell us about 5 feet of water poured down the street on monday. today, you see debris in giant piles in front of almost every house. let's go into one apartment that was completely destroyed on monday during the storm. >> i am 51 years old. monday night, i was sitting at the computer. i felt some water at my feet, i went to the back room to get my mop. the bedroom door was closed but the broom and fill with water. i opened the door and the water hit me. i opened up the store and the backyard had filled up with 3 feet of water, and that came in, so i was caught in from the

front and back. >> what were your thoughts entering your apartment for the first time after the storm? >> my first thought was, am i going to be able to start over? it is a little difficult when you are 50-something years old. and i am still alive, thank g. but why? we need help. we need red cross, fema to come around. there are a lot of senior citizens around that cannot get out. i have two sons. every day, we walk around to see if we can get them anything. >> are you were about seeing more extreme storms going forward? >> maybe it is a with a call for us. will there be more powerful storms? i do not know. probably. >> after we left, we walked east.

block after block, street after street, completely devastated. 4thare now at beech and 83t street. this church suffered massive damage. >> i am a deacon here at the church. what you are noticing is, the height of the water level is marked all around. i am standing next to the water mark inside the sanctuary in the church. the water mark is just below my shoulder. i am 6 feet 2 inches. i would say, maybe 4 feet 10 inches. this is the first time that people know of the bay meeting

the sea at 5 feet. this was all brought rockaway. this was the water level straight across. you can see the floor is still covered in mud. there is still no electricity . >> how would you describe this neighborhood? >> it is like a far island from new york, part of queens. it is a remote area. some people like to say the stepchild of new york. not that easy to get out here with public transportation. similar to how atlantic city looks, but atlantic city is not surrounded by water like far rockaway is. >> we are outside one of the largest public housing developments in the rockaways. the national guard has set up

food and water, a distribution point, and we are ready to talk to some people in line. >> this week has been really hectic on us, especially the little ones. >> what message do you have for city officials and mayor bloomberg? >> help, we need help. seriously. >> what we need right now is like. at night, it is pitch black. >> stay here for another couple of hours. the whole rockaways is black. they hav generator out there on the boulevard, but in the middle of the project, we can get some lights. >> we are standing in line because we have no means to survive. we stand in line every day. we get supplies from the army and the government, and that is

about it. today, we have been in line for about three hours. we have to wait. we have no other options. yesterday was four hours. as people who need, we are 0 to stay out here 10 hours to feed our kids. >> what would you tell to mayor bloomberg? >> he stepped it up with the transportation, and now he needs to step up and come out here and see us and help us. he needs to come out here instead of sending people out here. we are not mad at him, nothing he can do, but he could do more. >> we're getting some water. >> we need more help, with electricity. >> how would you describe this past week? >> sad.

i really felt like i was in south africa. when it is pitch dark, walking down the dirt road, that is what it looks like. >> we are going to pull out of this. rockaway got devastated, but we are going to come out of this stronger and hopefully, a lot better. >> mike is with us here in the studio. the anchor is intense in rockaways right now. >> these people had been in line for hours casting and bottled water. they were asking, where is the red cross, where is the city? is pitchlever down there on fr. the very next day, the york mayor bloomberg made an unannounced visit to the rockaways. the press was not notified. one reporter happened to see the

mayor there and got an interesting interaction between the mayor and some local residents. >> when are we going to get some help? >> this is the first drop off over the bridge. we cannot get a bottle of water. >> 1:00. >> interestingly, one of the more active relief efforts that we came across in the rockaways was done by a group called occupy sandy relief. these are alumni from occupy wall street who started organizing in the hours after the storm. the dinner community members.

we spoke to one woman who lives in the rockaways. we spoke to her outside of a restaurant that had been transformed into a lollipop. -- relief hub. >> i am good friends with the restaurant owner here. i was here for the entire hurricane. it has been a will win. we have been trying to organize things. we have been tried to put food out, a lot of things are coming in. i love rockaway, and that brought it back to where it was before the storm. what is happening behind me right now is we are working with sandy belief and ows. people are bringing in closure is, can foods, batteries, flashlights, everything that we need. people are able to come up and

pick through the different things they need@have some warm food that we're making four people. we have cars coming in and things are dropped off, and within 30 minutes, it is gone. people have literally lost everything. right now, the biggest issue is generators and pumps. we cannot get the electricity on until all of the basements are pumped out. if you walked down rockaway and knock on someone's door, every door, somebody will need help. the water that came in is toxic. i watched the waves coming in from the beach. there were at least two feet of flooding everywhere, in some places come up to 7 feet, depending on where you lived. everyone has been affected, it does not matter where you are. right now, a lot of it is

getting the basement pumped out, clearing out debris, trying to figure out where it goes. the boardwalk is destroyed. the water level here drop to about 5 feet. the wind was at almost 20 miles per hour, so it looks like the ocean came through this place. i watched cars float down the street. it was scary. out the window, you could see a fire. a huge flame of fire coming from breezy point. i think there were 80 homes lost there. devastated. the last couple of days have been very inspiring because people are starting to realize how bad rockaway was hit and a pair coming to the date and are coming to help. i do not know when we will get electricity back.

a lot of people's homes are heated by baseboard heaters, and this is salt water. the salt water will kill everything any tools, cars, when that salt water hits it come it is destroyed. >> how are the relief efforts we are seeing here different from what we are seeing with fema and the national guard? >> the met is handing out pieces of paper that tell you to call lea phone number to get help. hear, you can get help immediately. we are 0 to start organizing people. we are encouraging people who want to come down. bring your own cleaning supplies. you do not need to come here and grab supplies. have your own the. we are going to try to put signs up at the ends of streets so that people can put out a red

flag if they need help. so we have an idea of who is ok and who is not. you walk around and there is so much devastation, you do not know where to start. fema is providing some cell phone charging, but you have to wait in line for a one hour to get plugged in. besides that, i do not know w they are doing. i have seen some cleanup. definitely a lot of the boardwalk has been moved but nothing compared to what i am sure is happening in other parts of manhattan. >> what is the connection with occupy wall street in this effort? >> occupy was one of the first people that immediately knew that rockaways was. i was contacted by some of my friends in occupy wall street'

who reached out to me and said we wanted to help out. they have been the only one that have really helped, have been able to make tangible things go on. we have been open since it o'clock this morning. we have been giving things away all day long. -- it 8:00 this morning. people have warm clothes for their children, clean diapers. they will actually be able to eat tonight. >> i spoke to her on friday outside of that the island, which had been transformed into this impressive relief hub. while we're there, several cars came by and they were able to ask for specific items. in one case, someone asked for baby food, something that the national guard did not have.

they had a box of baby food that they were able to give them. there was an article on slate y sterday asking, is occupie outperforming official relief efforts? >> stay with us.

>> "the apocalyptic blues" by stephan said. "herding donkeys: the fight to rebuild the democratic party and reshape american politics this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. one of the hardest-hit areas of new york has been staten island. the storm killed at least 22 people there. mayor michael bloomberg has said more than 40,000 new york

residents have been displaced and the shelter. that is interesting, because more than 40,000 mourners were expected to run, the same number coming in the new york marathon this weekend. ultimately, it was canceled, but not because michael bloomberg wanted it canceled. it was because his staff revolted, the new york police commissioner revolted. blumberg had insisted it would go on, to the shock of his staff. he had, for days, resisted calls to cancel the marathon, saying he wanted to show that new york city could get past the storm. however, critics say that the people of new york what to do exactly the same thing and use the city's resources toward the recovery effort, not staging a

marathon. mayor bloomberg finally relented friday night after a marathon director told him it had to be scrapped. ultimately, it was canceled. we went out to staten island yesterday. >> we are approaching the bridge. that is the bridge that connects brooklyn with s.i.. this has been the starting point for the new york city marathon four years, but at the last minute, mayor bloomberg said, for the first time ever, the marathon would not take place. the deputy mayors and police commissioner said no way, and particularly, people on that and i then said, you have got to be kidding. many people are out of their homes, a number of people instead of using the police and

generators as it gets cold for the runners and the reporters that would be covering the run, they said, we need that help. that is why we are headed to s.i. right now. it is cold outside, so i am putting on another layer. we are coming up to a gas station. there are a lot of people in line. we are just checking out what people are doing here. where do you live? what are you doing, where did you get your gas? >> from fema. this is federally funded, so we're getting some gas. they are doing something right for us. other than that, the situation is horrible. the marathon, they are providing generators in central park. there are people without power. where are the generators for them?

the mayor, you are millionaires, billionaires.@ donate, come down, something. one of my co-workers, he has been without power for the past week. his base and is destroyed. he has no heat, hot water, gas, electric, so he is staying with me for a while. >> we are just on the stand island side. this is fort wadsworth, where the marathon would have begun. you can see the empty tent. we have hundreds of porter bodies lined up here. are you working with the marathon? >> off camera, please. >> the marathon people would not talk. maybe he will say something. he is security. hi. this is cancelled?

>> yes, it is. >> what do you think about that? was that appropriate? >> yes, i do. >> why did they cancel it? >> opposition between people. some people did not want it. >> why do you think it is a good idea? >> the mayor is supposed to be for the people of new york. this is your backyard. you have to take care of it. >> can you describe what happened here? >> all you have to do is walk down here in the disaster zone. south beach, midland beach, ocean breeze. everything. people are out here with no food, no clothes, everything. we have all this food and water and generators out here? people need them. >> was it set up for the marathon? >> the food was not.

the water and generators were. >> quite the image to see generators set up here, but not down the road. @> they woke up and donated. that is good. you have to take care of your home. >> you used to live here? >> i just moved last year to brooklyn. >> are you think you moved? >> you could say that, but i have family in far rockaway. >> what is the word on your family? >> they have to be evacuated. we had to separate them. some people had to get out of our rockaways, some had to go to queens, brooklyn, some have to go out to long island.

making the best of it. >> we just have driving, street after street of mass destruction. we are next to the atlantic ocean. these houses are devastated. the smell of oil from one house. they st dep was supposed to come. there is some kind of oil tanker below that i think could be dangerous. here, this family is trying to rebuild already. another car loaded up on their property. their couches in the backyard. water came in about 12 feet up. what did you think about the marathon about to be run down the road? >> i was really happy that they canceled it. if there was a marathon today,

we do not have the ability to come here because the bridges would be closed, everybody would be stopped. we need to keep working today. >> they still ran the marathon. >> we need some garbage bags, detergent. >> the runners came and helped you? >> we are in the shadow of the bridge, not a mile from fort wadsworth, where the marathon was to begin. that is where they have the generators and light, the electricity and food. the community rose up and said, how can you do it for them and not us? more than that, it would have meant the closing of the bridges. that is how they are going back and forth, beginning to rebuild. this is just down the road

former lives were lost. we are going to move on. >> what is your name? >> steve. >> you stayed home for the whole thing? what didn't look like? >> i came from my backyard and invited some people to stay in the car. >> you saw people and told them to come into your house? you were on the top floor? >> yes, the third floor. >> watch out. tell me your name and why you are here. >> we are here with family first from brooklyn. we came out here with some hot food. -- are going to give the out o

give out some of our food. i was there at the world trade centers, and i have never seen anything like this. >> what about the issue of global warming and climate change? >> things are changing. this may just be a sign of the worst. last year was a bad storm. this year we have this. it seems that as the years go by, we are having more destruction. >> do you think we have to change our way of living, maybe reduce our dependence on fossil fuels? >> i will not go there on that one, but i think wld find other means, using other natural resources. to heat up, fuel, cleaner energy.

>> climahange, global warming. as we and our report, i am standing in front of a massive garbage dump made from the refuse of the houses that once here on the south side of staten island. we have light hear from a generator but many communities, still almost a week into this catastrophe, superstorm sandy, do not have electricity. this dump is situated next to the atlantic ocean. the sea level is rising every year. i'm amy goodman. during our time on staten island, we saw only one red cross vehicle. on thursday, the staten island president openly criticized the red cross relief effort.@ >> as the president of half a million people, i am

disappointed at some of these not for profit organizations that collected lots of money and did not respond. one of them is the american red cross. i have not seen the american red cross set up a shelter, at the south shore, where people are buried in their homes, have nothing to eat, nothing to drink. yesterday, i toward the south shore with the mayor. the neighbors down there did not have electricity. they managed to distribute some pot of soup to people down there whose homes were destroyed. the american red cross was the work to be found. all of the american red cross people making these big salaries should be out there on the front lines. i am disappointed. my advice to the people of staten island is do not donate to the red cross. >> the red cross has since

apologized for its slow response. the spokesperson for the american red cross said, "do we wish we could of been there sooner? you bet. when you have 8 million people in need with roads damaged, infrastructure broken dam, and flooding everywhere, we cannot be there that passed, and we feel bad about that. a mecham back, we are joined by three people from the democracy now! team. so important to talk about who was there on the ground when the superstorm hit.

>> in a moment, we will be going to ohio to talk about voter suppression with our lieberman. before we do that, a moment ago, we played a clip of the staten island borough president talking about the lack of american red

cross response, and the red cross apologizing, saying this was a massive storm. they said afterwards, thisas such a massive storm, it was difficult to get there. democracy now! has been on the run from the beginning. we are both to talk about who was there. we are joined by our senior producer mike burke, our social media director, who lives in red hook, and steve martinez, who lives in new jersey, the hardest-hit area of the storm. jessica, let's begin with you. mike, you spoke with the organizer in the rockaways. it is stunning, the difference in response. >> i have been a resident in red

hook, also stepping in as an organizer, and a journalist. it has been an interesting experience. the flood in red hook has allowed the community in red hook to see ourselves. the networks that were in place, the french ships that were already there, everything has sprung into action, the morning after. two-thirds of our neighborhood was flooded by 3 feet of water. we are talking about every building, basement, first floor is wet and needs to be cleaned. almost all the businesses in red hook have been affected by this. people knew that the morning after. no one waited for the city. they started organizing. the story of the red hook initiative, which is beautiful, has made the news. they had no plan. they found that the water had come within inches of their building. people started calling them and they took action.

that started occupy red hook, connected to occupy sandy. where i was, everyone needed help. neighbors just started to help each other. i have still not seen the red cross. there has been some assistance from fema, but really, neighbors working together. >> the extent of the damage in red hook, it was underwater. >> yes, for a few hours. it drained away. furniture, flooring, almost everything needs to come down. right across the street from my house, a volunteer center sprung out. i am not clear who is organizing it, but hundreds of people were there. they did not have a printer, so i was pointing out some fires

for people to hand out in neighborhoods, whether it was food, medical, whether they needed certain tools. this is all happening without anybody really know who is in charge. >> so you have this quote from the american red cross spokesperson. should we have been there sooner? you bet. we cannot be there that fast and we feel bad about that. >> in the rockaways, we saw the national guard. they were giving away food and water. fema was there, but nobody could really figure out what they were doing. we did until the red cross anywhere. we were there several hours. one of the most active relief operations was from occupiey

sandy. i live near sunset park, which was not very badly damaged at all. a local church opened up its doors to organizers of occupy wall street, to turn the church into a relief center. i stopped by on saturday and sunday, and it was remarkable. there were so many people coming to volunteer, there was a line snaked around the block of people waiting to go to an orientation, learning to help. they were taking donations of food, preparing thousands of hot meals for people in red hook, rockaways, s.i.. they were also collecting clothes, blankets, cleaning supplies, and they were organizing caravans to go out to the neighborhoods that had been forgotten. one organizer i spoke to, who was very involved with occupy wall street in zucotti park, he

was one of the key people that helped to get the ball rolling on tuesday. i should also mention, 350.org, and recovers.org. we have a brief interview that i did with mike. >> my name is michael primo. we are in the basement of st. jacoby church in brooklyn. this is one of two distribution hubs we have for accepting donations, delivering donations, as well as volunteers to sights set up around the city. volunteers and donations can come here. from here, we load of cars for people lining up on the street.

we take those goods to 20 recovery sites that are scattered around flood zones in brooklyn and staten island, red hook, and queens. >> can you give us a sense of how many people have been involved in the relief effort? >> it is hard to tell. we are still getting a sense of how many people are involved. yesterday, we had about 3800 unique kits in the morning on our website. this morning, we have sent out at least 2500 volunteers caring about 15,000 hot meals that were delivered in roughly 120 carloads going out to the recovery site.

those are the lowball estimates based on the pounds of food coming through. >> how has occupy been able to organize this so quickly? >> over the last few years, there have been a lot of bonds build over this idea of or another until -- horizontal communities. it is all about individuals supporting of each other, standing side by side. because of that, there is a huge number of people that are brought together over the last year. when this tragedy hit, we were able to address those needs. >> that was an organizer with occupy sandy relief. new jersey was very hard hit. steve martinez, you live in new jersey. a lot of attention to how governor chris christie dealt with this, walking side by side with president obama, almost an endorsement for him.

talk about what happened in new jersey. >> in the sense that it was ground zero for sandy, the entire state has been impacted by the storm the northwest area, a lot of trees down. everyone lost power around us. we did not get power back until friday. my sister is still without power. a lot of businesses have yet to open. the shore has been, basically, destroyed. we grew up there, my family and i. my children have spent every summer there. the houses scattered like little black boxes across the short. we were fortunate to see, from an aerial photo from the

national guard, our house is still on its foundation, but we are not allowed on to the barrier islands, so we do not know what kind of damage it has sustained. >> the extent of the damage over all in new jersey, still so many people without power. >> it will be a long time before we can calculate the damage. the long-term ramifications for the state, perhaps the national economy, a lot of these houses along the shore, while there were many summer bungalows, a good number of homes that were destroyed were multimillion- dollar mansions that had been built at the turn of the 20th century. a lot of infrastructure was destroyed. a lot of people were financing, refinancing these homes as the

value of oceanfront property increased, and now they have ended up following a lot more money than they will ever be able to recover, especially now that insurance companies going to say that this is a high-risk area to be building. >> jessica, what do you never leave home without? >> some rubber gloves, masks -- the mold is getting bad in red hook. you have a flashlight because there is no power. i also have my iphone charger. that is the way that i stay connected. i interviewed some organizers yesterday about what is the next two weeks going to look like, what are you planning? they had no answer. they said we are just planning for tomorrow these people are carrying the burden of recovery in the local area. we need more resources in place.

>> tomorrow is the election date. new jersey, they are talking about voting by e-mail. in new york, there are 60 location that will not be there. >> we received a phone call yesterday that told us our polling station changed but we got no information of are supposed to do. we are supposed to contact county election to find out where to go. >> there were problems outside of voting outside of sandy. in ohio, president obama and mitt romney are pushing for a strong turnout. a record number for those people who have already done early voting. over the weekend, long lines were reported across ohio, as voters braved the cold weather. the secretary of state has issued a new, last-minute directive that would disqualify

ballots not accompanied by a form not accurately identifying the form of identification used. noting me now is someone who is tracking these laws. his latest book is "herding donkeys: the fight to rebuild the democratic party and reshape american politics." what is happening in ohio, ari? >> there have been very long lines at voting sites, ply as a consequence of john husted limiting early voting hours. the second thing, he issued this 11th hour directive on friday night, concerning provisional ballots, essentially shifting the onus from the poll workers to the voter to fill out all the correct information on the ballot form. if they do not fill it out correctly, it will be tossed out.

there were 200,000 provisional ballots cast in 2008. 40,000 of them were discarded. it is expected that number could increase substantially in 2012. so we are looking at a situation where a lot of ballots could be wrong with cast. that could be larger than the margin of victory, if the highest close. also, these ballots are not even counted until 10 days after the election, so we could be facing a recount if provisional ballots are making of the margin of >> romney poll watchers have been trained to watch out for those who have showed up with no photo id, even though no voter id law exists in that state. >> this is something that we see in iowa, wisconsin, and then you also have the tea party group urging their members to confront

voters. they also want to urge members to become a gop poll workers, inside the polling place. in columbus, they are urging that their members are allowed inside the polling place, which would create chaos. i have not heard many reports in the cleveland of people challenging voters in early voting. there is only one site in cleveland, so it is easy to keep track of what is happening, but on election day, there will be a lot of different sites. >> people in florida have reportedly waited as long as eight hours to vote early, causing state officials to file a lawsuit because of inadequate facilities. one official said that these long lines amounted to voter suppression. >> what is happening in this country cannot be allowed. >> let us vote!

>> that is florida. talk about florida and then bring it back to ohio. we have this video of the investigative journalist in montgomery county, the early voting lines that snake through this one area. the line is endless, and yet, there were only a few hours too early boat. >> it is looking a lot like 2008. what the republicans did, they cut down the early voting hours, including the sunday before the election, when black churches historic immobilize their constituents. this will cause a lot of long lines and confusion. that is what happened yesterday when they reopen their polling places then you have a situation

where they ran out of absentee ballots, so they had to close miami dade county. just a very chaotic. seven-hour lines in florida to vote? people do not have that much time to devote to voting. people say that it is being run by a third one country. some say that it is even worse than that because people do not even know if their vote will be counted. this is before election day, so who knows what will happen on election day. it is unfortunate, in a state with such voting history problems, that this is occurring. in ohio, lawn voting lines, not as long or chaotic as florida, but it had been raining and damp. most people i have seen were waiting it out. some people waited after the polls wehsed but were told it was too late. at least in cleveland, there are a limited number of people

sticking it out, realizing that they just have to deal with these long lines as a result of the decision made by the secretary of state. >> we will be doing an election night special from 7:00 eastern until 1:00 in the morning. many of your station will be running it. if not, go to democracynow.org. i will be speaking tonight at the barnes and nobles in tribeca. i will be talking about climate change and people movements over the last year. i want to think the amazing people who make this broadcast possible. democracy now! is looking for feedback from people who appreciate the closed captioning. email your comments to outreach@democracynow.org or mail them to democracy now! p.o. box 693, new york, ny 10013. box 693, new york, ny 10013.

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